Minnesota Resident Killed By Falling Tree

A falling tree killed a Minnesota resident from Eden Prairie earlier this month. The resident, 56 year old Nina MacKay, was out walking her two dogs when a falling basswood tree with a trunk diameter of 70 cm toppled and struck her.

According to Fox 9 News, basswood trees are highly prone to falls. As the trees aggressively expand, the wood remains soft and weak.

According to local arborist Baird Johnson, the odds of getting hit by a falling tree are less than being struck by lightning. The offending basswood tree had become infested with bugs that were eating the trunk from the inside out, making it as soft as Styrofoam.

Minnesota has a high number of basswood trees, as they grow quickly and easily. Unfortunately that means many are prone to falling. The basswood tree that killed MacKay was 90 years old when it fell, and investigators believe that winds reached 23 miles per hour at the time.